Equity Does Not Stop the Machinery, and It Changes Your Options
Worth separating carefully, because owners assume that a house worth more than the loan is safe. Section 1308 runs from delinquency and says nothing about equity, so the inspections, the notice and the registry reporting proceed regardless.
What equity changes is what you can do about it. An owner with real value in a property has routes that an underwater owner does not, including selling and keeping the difference rather than walking away from nothing. The framework is on our page covering the inspection and the registry.
So Is Selling Better Than Letting It Go?
The Determination Is the Thing to Contest
Section 1309 opens the expedited foreclosure route for property found vacant and abandoned, and section 1308 requires a determination before a notice is posted.
Both turn on a judgement rather than on the bare fact of a house being empty after a fire. An owner who responds to the posted notice, keeps somebody visiting and is visibly dealing with the property is contesting that judgement in the only way that matters.
What Does Visibly Dealing With It Look Like?
We publish no loan positions, determinations or values for individual West Side properties. Your servicer, the county clerk's records and local sale evidence answer those.
Rising Values Attract Attention
A damaged property on a street where values are moving is noticed by more parties than one where nothing is happening. Expect approaches, and treat the timing of them as information: buyers who appear immediately after a notice goes up have been looking at something other than your house.
Older Framing Supports Repair
Much of the housing here predates modern framing, and timber of that era chars on the surface and can frequently be assessed and retained. Combined with values that now carry the cost of the work, repairing beats selling on a good deal of this stock, and we say so when it does.
Secure It Before Winter
Freeze and thaw on charred timber does what the fire started. Securing the building preserves the repairability that the rising values make worth having, and it costs a fraction of any repair.
The West Side in Context
Where a large share of houses carry no mortgage, see our page about the East Side. Where values are strongest, see our page for North Buffalo and Elmwood.
The Statutes Behind a West Side File
Sections 1308, 1309 and 1310 of the RPAPL took effect on 20 December 2016. Section 1308 requires inspection within 90 days of delinquency and repeat inspections every 25 to 35 days at differing times.
A notice must be posted within 7 business days of a determination, and non-response for 7 consecutive days matters. Section 1310 reporting is triggered at 90 or more days of delinquency.
West Side Questions
I Am Behind but the House Is Worth More Than the Loan.
Then selling on your own terms almost certainly beats letting the process run. The surplus is yours only if you get there first.
A Notice Went up. Is It Over?
No. It reflects a determination, and responding to it is how that determination gets contested. Speak to a New York lawyer.
Will You Buy on the West Side?
Yes, and on sound stock at current values we will frequently tell you repairing or a conventional sale beats us.